Smruti Koppikar

Mumbai’s electorate trends, routs and new beginnings

The data map of results in Mumbai’s six Lok Sabha seats in the last seven elections tell us mini-stories about the parties, now jostling for our attention – and votes.

2019 polls: Think hard, really hard, before you vote

Mumbai’s character and geography makes voting an even more absorbing exercise

Think women’s work and safety this International Women’s Day

Violence and crimes against women have been steadily rising and reached a record high in 2018

War, the final solution for Pulwama? It’s not a video game

Who’s to tell the battle-hungry that battles scar both sides, wars extract a heavy price from all? Who’s to shout that wars are ruinous, disastrous in every way for everyone?

What parallels can Mumbai draw from New York vs Amazon?

The svayamvar-style wooing of a corporate may not happen where Mumbai contends with dozens of cities but the city has given primacy to private interests over the public in different ways.

30 years after ‘Pratibha’: Mumbai’s tryst with illegal buildings

Through the late 80s, Pratibha was the shorthand reference for brazen illegalities, especially the “FSI scam”, in real estate

Infighting in Mumbai Congress: A recipe for electoral disaster

At stake are the six Lok Sabha and 36 Assembly seats during

Why do Bollywood’s most powerful icons choose silence?

It is a fact that some of the most powerful among the stars are excessively deferential to those in power

What will the Thackeray memorial mean to Mumbai?

With an impending general election, the Devendra Fadnavis government has reached out to its angry ally, Shiv Sena, through the Thackeray memorial.

BEST needs a recovery plan, not mere band-aids

The unions representing 35,000 to 40,000 workers are not completely satisfied with the outcome; their demands for better wages and benefits for workers have only been partially fulfilled

You can stop BEST from bleeding to death, Mr Fadnavis

Nearly 29-30 lakh commuters who depend on BEST, the city’s second-most popular transport network after the suburban railways, were hard hit by the strike.

Polls 2019: Parties disconnected, voters disengaged

The general election in April-May 2014 saw 55% voter turnout; it was a record of sorts where turnout percentages in national, state and especially local elections have generally hovered around 40%.

Cities in 2018: Simple ideas, fancy urban tech

The SDGs and the New Urban Agenda remain a challenge for cities. Goal 11 of the SDGs, to build sustainable cities, has proved to be a particularly tough one for urban areas across continents.

Cities in 2018: World trends, lessons from Amazon HQ2

As the year comes to a close, it’s time to cast a gaze across the world to pick up actions, reports and trends in urban issues which hold relevance for us in Indian cities or signal a sense of the future. The United Nations’ 2018 Revision of World Urbanisation Prospects told us that India will have added the largest number of urban dwellers – 416 million – by 2050, India along with China and Nigeria will account for 35% of the projected growth of the world’s urban population till that year, and Delhi is tipped to be the world’s most populous city around 2028.

When foot soldiers of e-commerce yearn for a morsel

A video showing a food parcel delivery executive opening food packets which he was to deliver to customers was doing the rounds on social media platforms.

Mumbai may pay the price of an environment-unfriendly government

The pace and scale at which Mumbai’s natural environment has sought to be sacrificed in the last four years are shocking, to say the least

Farmers’ march: Urban India finally registers farm distress

Citizens responded to farmers’ protests as disruptions in their daily lives, like traffic jams, an intrusion into their space

Aggregator cabs are great for users but what do they mean for the city?

Are Mahul’s Mumbaiites lesser citizens of the State?

The area is home to humongous oil refineries, powers stations, dozens of fertiliser and chemical plants; India’s Central Pollution Control Board tagged it as “critically polluted” years ago

Mumbai’s tryst with October heat and climate change

Mumbai, by scientific reckoning, felt climate change; sceptics of the phenomenon can go for a swim.

Amruta Fadnavis: A welcome change who could do more

Climate change is here. What’s Mumbai doing about it?

Where are the institutional arrangements Mumbai needs? What governance mechanisms exist? What financial resources have been committed? Indeed, what are Mumbai’s goals to reduce emissions?

#MeToo juggernaut is rolling; some gains are visible

Only when voices like those of Dutta rose above the collective silence and were joined in by others that the law was taken seriously

Tanushree Dutta was Bollywood’s #MeToo moment; it passed by

Manto’s Bombay stories and Mumbai’s debt

Manto, the biopic based on the life and times of author, script-writer, and journalist Saadat Hasan Manto, has rekindled interest in the maverick man. His large oeuvre – hundreds of short stories, a novel, essays, letters, nearly 150 radio plays, dozens of film scripts, and dialogues – are characterised by what renowned novelist Salman Rushdie once described as “low-life fictions”, the trials and triumphs of everyday people, the urgent communal question, and textures and flavours of city life.

Mumbai’s road menace: Bikers on the wrong side

Mumbai Police’s traffic department doesn’t seem to treat this wrong-side riding as a serious crime yet, serious enough to warrant large-scale nabbing and in-your-face education campaigns

The economics of Ganeshotsav

The LPG cylinder has breached the ₹700 mark and comes for nothing less than ₹900 or so in the grey market. Yet, the fervour to celebrate Ganeshotsav does not seem diminished across Mumbai.

No means no, Ram Kadam. Say sorry

Kadam’s repugnant remarks have touched upon at least two issues: the incidence of kidnapping of girls even in a city like Mumbai, and the agency that girls/women have in deciding their partner

RK Studio sale and the politics of forgetting heritage

There is nothing overtly political about the act of selling off a piece of legacy

Kerala flood: Some lessons to learn

Keralites have earned new admirers for the manner in which they faced the flood fury.